Pre-Centennial

Minneapolis in '73 Worldcon... 1873, that is

When:

Who:

Guest of Honor: Jules Verne (subject to availability and transportation from France)
Toastmaster: Mark Twain (subject to availability and possible conflict with Jumping Frog Contest)
Welcome neofen Warren Clarke Eustis and Henry Martin Williamson the first graduates of the University of Minnesota in their senior year

Where:

Nicollet House, downtown Minneapolis
Nicollet House occupies the entire block on Washington Ave. between Nicollet and Hennepin.
140 rooms, with steam heat and gas lights. Banquet will be held in the spacious and elegantly frescoed dining room. The tables are bountifully supplied with all manner of good things in their proper season. Consuite will have a selection of imported beers from St. Paul.
Special convention rate of $2 a day, mention Mpls in '73.
Overflow hotels within walking distance.
Sixty-nine saloons and seventeen restaurants nearby, Restaurant Guide by Ignatius Donnelly.

Why:

From a discussion at the Mpls in '73 Worldcon in 1973, a brave new Worldcon was born!
Time travel paradoxes to be resolved at an earlier date.

How:

The Dodd Clegler Institute of Trans-Temporal Studies will serve as transportation hubs for Pre-Centennial fans from a non-local time-space nexus. Dates and places TBA.

Planned activities:

Science Programming: Discussions of technology and how it will affect the life of the late 1800sFannish Programming: How to use Hecto. Current Amateur Press Associations. Can we ever communicate as fast as the Pony Express again? Will dried milk (patented 1872) ever be as big as blog?Literature Programming: There will be discussions of the works of GoH Jules Verne, Edgar Allan Poe, and other recent speculative fiction authors.
Help make sure Willa Cather's parents are in love and conceive her a month after the con.
There will be a brief memorial service for Dr. David Livingstone.

Transportation in Minneapolis:

City Omnibus Line has several omnibusses, hacks, sleighs and baggage wagons with which they carry passengers to and from various trains and to different parts of the city and different stops on the timeline.
Two railroads for your convenience: St. Paul & Pacific, Milwaukee & Minneapolis.

What to bring:

No technology or artifacts that could not be extant in April, 1873. This includes money.

How to pay for membership and transportation:

Send us ideas, investments opportunities, winning sports teams to bet on, and so forth, for the 1873 period. Nothing that will make a major splash; no inventing the telephone or becoming so rich that we alter history. Just nice, safe investments that will fund the convention (and a century of partying!) and pay off big for the concom now.

Convention Committee

David E Romm
Linda Lounsbury, History Liaison
Other committee members to be added as needed. Remember our motto: We CAN be bribed.